


Useless Bisexuals

by vanishedSchism



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Actually it's a character finding out they're asexual which is exactly as awkward as you'd expect, Asexual Character, Mind Control
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-15
Updated: 2015-09-15
Packaged: 2018-04-15 02:32:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4589706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vanishedSchism/pseuds/vanishedSchism
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Heteronormativity strikes again and makes a mission in Bialya go really wrong. But hey, at least everyone learns a bit about themselves!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Useless Bisexuals

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [Amelia](http://dickgraysoff.tumblr.com/) for a Secret Santa in July.

_Dude that is so COOL. I wish I could beat the crud out of bad guys and take robot heads as souveniers and stuff! We do cool stuff here too though. Yesterday Mom and I were rescuing this Oryx that had hurt its leg in a poachers trap and after we'd bandaged it up the rest of the herd came up to us and one even nudged my arm! it was so cool! I really felt like one of them._

_The poachers are getting more common though. Its great to see Mom yelling at them when she sees them, but they're hurting the animals. I wish I could do something about it..._

_Mom says you should come over for dinner some time! You should bring the team too! She says she never got to properly thank you for helping me and since you're my blood-sis and all it's rude not to have you over for dinner._

Instead of being signed with a name, Gar had drawn a picture of a four legged animal of some sort, presumably an onyx, given the subject of the letter and the horns, though it could just as easily be a giraffe.

M'gann smiled as she folded the slip of paper. 

_Arriving Kid Flash B03_ the zeta beam announced. 

"Ooh, what's that? Can I see?" Wally said, making the pages flutter together with the speed of his arrival. 

"I thought you had a mission today?"

Wally put his arms behind his head and flopped backwards onto the couch. "I did. And I'm done. Ice boy won't be bothering anyone else with his bad pickup lines for a while." 

"If only it were just him." 

"What?"

"I was making cookies, do you want some?" 

"I am _always_ ready to eat your cookies Megan." 

With Wally thusly distracted, the topic of the letter didn't come back up until the entire team was gathered later that night. 

Now it was Robin lying across the couch, though Wally had manuevered himself under the younger boy's legs as they both watched an action movie of some sort or another. 

Artemis was sitting in a nearby chair, clearly not interested in the movie. "Anything planned for tonight?" she asked. 

"We have not been assigned any missions tonight," Aqualad said, though he didn't look thrilled about the movie either. This was the perfect time. 

"I actually have something we can do. I got a letter from Garfield and his mom asking us to dinner." 

"Are they in town?" Robin asked, half rising from where he was lying on the couch. 

"Umm, not quite." 

Kid Flash jumped up, dumping Robin to the floor. Or, if it had been anybody but Robin sitting on him, he would have dumped them to the floor. Robin must have felt Kid Flash moving or something, because he was moving even before the speedster was. The result was that they both stood up at pretty much the same time. 

"We're going Qurac!"

M'gann smiled in Aqualad's direction. "He said the entire team is welcome." 

Aqualad frowned, but after glancing back at the terrible movie on the tv screen, seemed to make up his mind. 

"You should bring something before you arrive without warning." 

\-----------------

M'gann seemed uncharacteristically nervous as she approached the door. Conner stood slightly behind her, his hands on her shoulders, but even with her back to him, Dick could tell she was worrying her lip. That was fair, the last time they were Qurac they'd almost gotten Garfield killed (what a way to debut himself as a mission leader) so it made sense that she was nervous. 

She didn't have to worry though, because she'd barely raised her fist to knock on the door when it was thrust open and a little boy tackled M'gann. 

"Sis!" he yelled. 

"Gar!" M'gann said as she caught him in her arms and twirled him as she rose off the ground. They both laughed and just like that all the tension was gone. By the time they'd both returned to the ground, Marie Logan was smiling in the doorway. 

"It's good to see you again M'gann." 

Garfield squeezed M'gann's waist in a quick hug before darting off- right toward Wally. "Dude, Sis said you got a robot head from your last mission!" Wally beamed and the two began chatting animatedly about the various misadventures they'd gotten into. 

"...So I run up behind him and notice this piece where the head is connected to the rest of the body and I think-" 

"You think that your best friend just told you its weak point." Dick said, wrapping his arm around Wally. His best friend was way too tall for Dick to comfortably drape his arm over Wally's shoulder so he settled for the next best thing and loosely gripped Wally's waist. Garfield's eyes follow the gesture, but then Wally continues talking and all his attention is back on the speedster. 

"And I think wow, Boy Wonder-"

"-Who is currently distracting the fire-breathing robot-"

Dick ducked out of the way of Wally's smack, before it could land, popping up behind Wally as the speedster grumbled something a kid Garfield's age probably shouldn't hear. Garfield just beamed. 

By the time Wally finally completed the story of how he collected his newest trophy (with plenty of comments from Dick) Marie had ushered the rest of the team inside. 

Dinner was nice, though Marie kept apologizing for not having anything better than tomato soup and grilled cheese, which made M'gann apologize for coming on such short notice and not bringing anything with her, which made Marie apologize for making them feel unwelcome. After all the pleasantries though, Garfield launched into a windblown explanation of everything he and his mom had been up to in the sanctuary. He explained that they were in the field a lot more since losing the shed, but that was okay because that meant he got to get really close to the animals. He was just launching into a story about when he had seen a caracal as he and his mom were packing up after a full day of helping Ibex when he literally transformed into a medium sized cat. 

"And so it was looking at me with these big eyes- WHOAH." The green lynx picked up his paws and examined them in a very human like gesture, completely forgetting about his story. Only Marie didn't seem surprised. 

"That's not the first time that's happened."

Wally and Garfield said "What?" at the same time. 

"He can't control it." 

"Oh," M'gann said. "I can help with that." 

"You can?" Garfield asked, once again human and beaming. "That'd be so cool Sis!" 

"Of course!" 

\---------------------

While M'gann and Marie went into the yard to teach Garfield how to control his abilities, Wally, Conner and Dick decided to make up for their last visit by rebuilding the shed. Or, Wally had volunteered to rebuild the shed in "less time than it takes to blink" and Dick had immediately jumped up to stop that from happening. Garfield apparently decided to use a monkey as his test shape, so Conner came along to avoid that. 

"I don't get why I can't just do this myself," Wally whined as he picked up a piece of wood that was almost as tall as he was. 

"You remember that time you tried to build a bunk bed?" 

"Ikea furniture doesn't count." 

"You can't blame a single brand for your lack of ability."

"I totally can." 

"If you two will stop bickering," Conner cut in, "maybe someone could tell me what I'm supposed to do with this?" He hefted a huge slab of wood. 

"Make it a door," Wally said at the same time Dick said, "it should probably become the base." 

Conner sighed, but when he opened his mouth it wasn't to argue with his teammates. "Is that Queen Bee?"

Dick looked where Conner indicated. "So not aster," he breathed. 

Queen Bee, and it was definitely her, was walking straight up to the house with a platoon of soldiers. Their guns weren't raised at least, but that was the only good thing about the situation. Especially because she'd noticed them. 

Queen Bee smiled at them and then continued toward the house. 

Although they were safe from this distance, none of the boys could get close enough to stop her without risking being put under her thrall. Dick turned on his com. 

"Miss Martian. Incoming, Queen Bee. I don't know what she wants but she has soldiers." 

The psychic link was established a moment later. _Got it._

And then there was nothing to do but wait. They couldn't get close to Queen Bee, but they couldn't just ignore her either. She was clearly here for something, and anyway, those soldiers were making Dick nervous. 

"What do you think she wants?" Wally asked, dropping the wood and running up next to Dick. 

"I don't know."

"Ooh you _hate_ that," he teased. 

"Yeah, but sometimes I think I should step into your shoes every once in a while." 

Wally grinned and Dick felt himself relax a bit. He hated that he couldn't fight this enemy- even though most of their missions on the Team were recon, it was generally true that if they got spotted he'd be able to hold his own- but the friendly banter helped distract him. 

Finally Queen Bee made it to the door and... knocked. Dick wasn't sure what he'd been expecting, a missile being fired at the door maybe, but knocking wasn't on the list. 

Marie opened the door with a glare. 

Dick was too far away to hear what they were saying, but Conner was clearly listening. He frowned. 

_They're talking about property rights. Queen Bee wants to buy the land._

Dick didn't need Conner to tell him what Marie's response was. She looked like she was ready to rip Queen Bee's head right off. At least... for a moment. 

Dick saw Wally adjust his goggles, probably going for the binocular feature. Dick hoped Wally saw something, because all /he/ saw was Marie ready to kill one moment and looking completely relaxed the next. 

_Miss. M, do you have Garfield?_ Dick asked over the psychic link as Queen Bee walked into the house. 

No response. 

_Miss M?_

Dick looked at Conner and Wally. They were as concerned as he was. They were rapidly adding dis to this aster. 

_Superboy, go around the back and find Miss Martian and Garfield. The link's still up so she's not unconscious. KF get the guns from those soldiers, but if Queen Bee shows up, get out of there. I'm going in._

Conner and Wally were off, trusting Robin in Aqualad's absence. Dick hoped that he was worthy of that trust as he also headed for the house. He heard the soldiers start to shout in surprise as he slipped into the house through the bathroom window. 

Marie was still standing in the doorway, though Queen Bee was nowhere to be seen. Dick expected that meant she was outside, and only hoped that Wally had gotten away before he ended up in her sphere of influence. He jumped onto the table where they’d eaten a couple of hours ago, and from there swung into the rafters. As long as he stayed quiet, he’d be able to observe unseen. 

Kid Flash, did you get the guns? … KF? 

No answer.

Superboy. Status.

Dick’s hands tightened on the wooden beam he was perched on. No answers from anyone. He still didn’t know what had happened to M’gann, but he was starting to suspect that Queen Bee had enthralled Marie Logan. 

Speak of the devil. 

Queen Bee walked into the house, Wally trailing after her. Marie closed the door behind her. 

“You can come out Boy Wonder,” she said. “I have all your friends.” 

Like he was about to do that. He wasn’t positive as to how Queen Bee’s power worked (apparently it affected more than just men) but he assumed that she had to see a person in order to start it, otherwise how else would he still be unaffected? Unless he had been affected, but then why would he still be hiding? No, he was definitely himself and Queen Bee didn’t know where to look for him. He still had a chance to do something. 

He took a deep breath before he reached into his belt and threw down a smoke pellet. As everyone was choking on the foul smelling gas it released, he jumped down from the rafters. He had time to throw one punch at Queen Bee before Wally slammed into him. 

The tackle pinned his arms to his side, but his feet were still free, so as soon as they hit the ground, Dick pulled his knees up and kicked Wally right in the chest. That loosened his grin enough from Dick to squirm out of it. He jumped to his feet, unfortunately right in front of Queen Bee. 

He tensed as he felt her hand on his shoulder. He could, of course, grab and snap her wrist from this angle, but that wouldn’t incapacitate her and Batman taught him not to strike to hurt, so he just took a breath of air that still smelled like rotten eggs and waited for Queen Bee to make her move. 

“That is strange,” she said, shoving him away from her. Dick was only too happy to scramble away. Queen Bee frowned at him for a moment but her expression hardened when she pointed at Dick. 

“Kill him.” 

And then Wally was running at him again. 

This time Dick was expecting it, so he had time to duck and roll- right between Wally’s legs. The move was unexpected enough that it gave him a second to act while Wally stared ahead and tried to figure out where he was. That was as much time as he needed to kick his best friend in the back of the knee. 

However, because Wally was his best friend, Dick didn’t kick hard enough to break anything- or actually incapacitate the speedster- a mistake he paid for when Wally turned around and began rapid-fire punching his gut. 

The blows were coming too fast for him to avoid, and though they weren’t near the level of power Wally could actually manage, Dick was small and there were a lot of them. He felt something crack and it didn’t take long before he felt himself start to sway on his feet. He went with his instinct and dropped to the ground.

Here, Wally’s height worked against him. With Robin on the ground, he couldn’t actually reach his target, which gave Dick enough time to grab to pull a line from his belt and wrap it around Wally’s legs. Then he jumped up and headed for the door. 

When Wally tried to follow, the line around his legs tightened, dropping him to the ground. Dick didn’t pause before running straight for Queen Bee. She had a dagger in her hand, but a thrown batarang took care of that pretty quickly.

She swore and tried to punch Dick, though he easily dodged the blow and returned one of his own. And then they were fighting and despite him still not understanding how Queen Bee had enthralled M’gann or Marie, and despite how he had managed to screw up leading a mission that was supposed to just be a night off, and despite how his ribs ached, he could lose himself in the block-punch rhythm of a simple fist fight. 

He almost did. 

It was only the feeling of someone behind him and the edge of a knife at his throat that reminded him Queen Bee wasn’t his only opponent. 

Stupid. 

Queen Bee smirked and Dick could see her drop her guard. So he wasn’t the only one making amateur mistakes. He used all of the training Batman had given him to knock her out with one punch. It was all he had time for before Wally tried to slit his throat. 

His idiocy apparently didn’t extend to his technical skill, because Queen Bee went down, just as he expected. The blade at his throat pushed deeper for a second before pulling away and falling to the ground. 

“OhmygodRobin. Rob are you okay? I’msosorry.Shityou’rebleeding.” Dick leaned back, right into Wally, who immediately wrapped his arms around him. He could hear Marie groan behind them. Apparently he was right about Queen Bee having to be conscious to maintain her control. He would have been in trouble if that wasn’t the case. 

He half heartedly elbowed Wally, because he needed to actually restrain Queen Bee and felt terrible when his friend immediately jumped back. 

“You were mind controlled,” he said as he pulled out a pair of handcuffs. They couldn’t actually arrest Queen Bee- there was nothing to charge her with- but he didn’t want her up and about either. “You didn’t know what you were doing."

Wally made an unconvinced noise, but he dropped the subject. 

\----------------------

Dick walked out of the room looking like he’d just gotten yelled at. Or sternly told that his performance was disappointing and that he should have done better, which Wally supposed was the Batman equivalent. 

“Hey man,” he said, holding up a cookie that Dick refused with a gesture. Wally popped it into his mouth and talked around the crumbs, “how’d it go?” He was trying his best not to look at the scab across Dick’s neck, but it was hard. He had done that. 

“He looked at me the same way you are now,” Dick snapped. 

“So let me get this straight,” Artemis said without getting up from her chair. “You’re upset because you didn’t get reprimanded?” She turned around so she could smirk at him. “You really are a birdbrain.” 

Wally grinned and nudged him, “she’s got a point.” 

Dick just snatched a cookie from the tray in front of Wally. 

Wally tried to let the topic go, he really did, but there was one thing that had been bugging him ever since they got back from Qurac. 

“So how did you manage it? BeatingQueenBeeImean.” Everyone in the room, so, Kaldur and Artemis, who weren’t even there, looked up at that question. It was enough that Dick actually ran a hand through his hair, the clearest indication of his frustration Wally had seen. 

“I don’t know. Obviously our intel is wrong because she was able to influence M’gann and Marie, but I have no idea why it didn’t work on me.” 

Artemis grinned at that. “It worked on M’gann? I knew it!” 

Wally just looked at Dick. “You didn’t think she was hot?” 

His best friend blinked and, even with the mask on, Wally could see his eyebrows crease in that expression that meant, ‘what the hell are you talking about, why would I ever consider that?’ But he sounded more confused than anything else when he said, “Did you?” 

“Did you see her? Of course I did! NotthatIwouldconsideranything I mean notwithM’gannaroundatleast, but totally, yeah.” 

Dick blinked at him. 

“You seriously didn’t think about it?"

“About what? What are you talking about.” 

Wally just kind of stepped back because he had no idea how to deal with this new information. Dick didn’t think girls were hot. Did he think guys were hot? Did it matter? 

Luckily, Artemis saved him from his thoughts. “Robin, you said M’gann and Marie were affected right?"

“Definitely Marie, I’m not positive about Miss M, but I think so.” 

“It appears,” Kaldur spoke up, “that we have underestimated Queen Bee’s abilities."

“Or maybe we’re being a little too heteronormative here. I’m no detective or anything, but I think it’s pretty clear that she controls people who’re attracted to her. That’s always been the subtext behind the whole ‘can control men’ thing, right?"

Everyone but Dick made various sounds of acknowledgement.

“But I like girls,” he said quietly.

“Robin,” Artemis said, draping her arm around Dick’s shoulder. “Have you ever thought about having sex?"

Wally watched as Dick’s ears changed from brown to fiery red. “No. No! Why would I think about that?” 

He looked around the room at his three teammates. Wally was trying not to laugh (it was so rare to see Dick get flustered) Artemis was smirking like she knew something and Kaldur looked analytical- and the most understanding of any of them. 

“So Boy Wonder,” Artemis said, “you’ve never looked at someone, girl or guy, and gotten a tingly feeling in your nethers when you stare at that ass?"

Robin looked like he couldn’t tell if she was joking or not. He looked at Wally for confirmation. 

“Hey bro, I’m only joking like half the time."

“So when you said you wish you were calculus homework, you actually wanted to be,” he paused before continuing, “hard and done against the desk?” 

Now it was Wally’s turn to blush. “No! That was a joking time. Totally joking. But uh, sometimes, yeah.” 

Kaldur broke in before they got into an in-depth analysis of Wally’s flirting. 

“Robin,” he said, “I believe it would help if you looked up the terms ‘sexual attraction’, ‘asexual’, and ‘demisexual.’” 

Of course the nerd immediately pulled out his wrist computer and began typing. Wally didn’t really know what was happening, so he leaned in to look over Dick’s shoulder. 

“Sexual attraction,” he read out after a bit of googling. Apparently there wasn’t a straight up dictionary definition for it. "'Seeing someone and not only finding them attractive, but thinking you'd like to have sex with them, like fantasies and such. It's attraction to another person that at it's end wants to be physically intimate, as opposed to being attracted to someone in a way where you think, 'I'd like to get to know them' or 'I want to be their best friend' or 'I want to be close to that person’.’ Fantasies? Really?” He frowned and continued typing. A bit of googling revealed that an asexual was a person that didn’t feel sexual attraction, and a demisexual was someone who only felt it after they got to know a person really well. 

Eventually the others got bored and went off to do their own stuff and Wally and Dick migrated to the couch. Dick leaned against Wally’s side as he continued to research asexuality on his wrist computer. “I still can’t believe that's a real thing."

“Hmm?" 

“Looking at people and wanting to have sex with them. I just… don’t get it I guess.” He looked up at Wally. “How do you know who it’s gonna end up being?” 

“You mean who I’m gonna find myself attracted to? I dunno Rob. It just happens. Like people have types, but it’s not like you really have any control over it.” 

Dick shook his head. “Weird.” 

Wally laughed and messed up Dick’s hair, which earned him retaliation in the form of tickles directed at his side, and then all of this confusion about sexuality and attraction and Queen Bee went right out the window as they began an epic tickle fight.


End file.
